Wednesday, Mar 18, 2009

Over one million BTL mortgages are in arrears!

BBC: Rental repossessions on the rise

"It's a sign of the times - tenants are facing eviction because their landlords can't pay the mortgage. In 1998 there were around 28,700 buy-to-let mortgages in arrears. In 2008 there were 1.15m, says the Council of Mortgage Lenders." Seeing as there are only two million or so rental properties in the UK, that is quite stupendous!

Posted by mark wadsworth @ 01:43 PM (1458 views) Add Comment

12 Comments

1. mark wadsworth said...

Having researched a bit, whoever cobbled that article together deserves a kicking. The total number of BLT mortgages is only around 1.15 million, not the number of BTL mortgages in arrears.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009 02:00PM Report Comment
 

2. stillthinking said...

Are you sure about the 2 million rental properties in total? I would have thought it would be larger. That doesn't seem to be all that many. Are you including social housing etc?

Wednesday, March 18, 2009 02:02PM Report Comment
 

3. str 2007 said...

Agreed Mark

I nearly fell off my chair when I saw this - knowing there to be about 1million BTL mortgages.

Are people really paid a wage for this drivel, out of our licence fee ?

Wednesday, March 18, 2009 02:07PM Report Comment
 

4. mark wadsworth said...

@ ST, there are 25 million households altogether, seventy per cent are owner-occupiers, twenty per cent are in social housing (LA or Housing Association) and ten per cent in private rented = two and a half million or thereabouts.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009 02:41PM Report Comment
 

5. uncle tom said...

stillthinking,

In round numbers, I think the breakdown is roughly:

Owner-occupied - 18m
Social lets - 5m
Private lets - 3m

About 40% of the owner-occupied properties are mortgage free, and the freehold of some social lets are in private hands.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009 02:44PM Report Comment
 

6. str 2007 said...

So of the 2.5 million private lets, is it correct that only 40% or so have mortgages against them ?

I seem to recall a figure of about 1 million BTL mortgages - am I correct ?

Wednesday, March 18, 2009 03:12PM Report Comment
 

7. uncle tom said...

1.15 BTL mortgages is the CML figure, so most rented property is owned outright by the landlord.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009 03:45PM Report Comment
 

8. crunchy said...

Perhaps it's time for the landlords credit history and references to be scruntinised.

Too one sided.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009 03:50PM Report Comment
 

9. stillthinking said...

Thanks Mark and UT,
Thats a lot of social housing.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009 04:01PM Report Comment
 

10. peter_2008 said...

I have a plan! I will print out 1 million fake copies of repossession/eviction notice. And I will post to every BTL property in this country. What will happen then?

Wednesday, March 18, 2009 04:06PM Report Comment
 

11. mark wadsworth said...

@ ST, exactly, Thatcher did sell off a lot, but the headline figure for "council housing" (down to about two million homes) is totally misleading, you have to add back Housing Association stuff.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009 04:21PM Report Comment
 

12. bystander said...

peter_2008 - answer you'll be about 100K (cost of B/W print in post office about 10p each) +postage worse off, for what??

Wednesday, March 18, 2009 04:24PM Report Comment
 

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